1000 Park Avenue: Review and Ratings

Review of 1000 Park Avenue by Carter Horsley

This large, brown brick apartment house with terra-cotta decoration in a neo-Gothic style at 1000 Park Avenue on the northwest corner at 84^th Street was designed by Emery Roth for Bing & Bing, one of the city's major developers of luxury residential buildings in the first half of the 20th Century.

The 13-story building has 70 co-operative apartments and was erected in 1916.

Bottom Line

For many years, this handsome pre-war building benefitted from having churches on its north and south sides, which permitted it to have more “light and air” than most apartment houses on the avenue. However, the church on the north entered negotiations in 2013 with a developer to use its unused air rights.

Description

This apartment building is one of the most decorative in the city with superb terra-cotta figures including Gothic men, squirrels and gargoyles. 

The base of the building has two-story inset window spaces in which the windows do not fully occupy the inset space, an interesting design choice. There is a half-story granite base and the high and quite ornate entrance surround is flanked by granite pedestals and small light sconces.  Above the entrance are four large terracotta vertical decorative elements that add considerable emphasis to the entrance and complement the shorter terracotta vertical elements that descend from the bandcourse over the third floor, above which the masonry façade is divided by narrow piers. The 12^th floor has some balconies and there are decorative spandrels beneath the top-floor windows.

The building is in good condition, although part of its cornice line along the avenue and side-street has unfortunately been cut away and replaced with a railing.

Amenities

It has a full-time doorman and some decorative balconies and permits some protruding air-conditioners. 

It has no garage and no gym.

Apartments

Apartment 12A is a six-bedroom unit with a 9-foot-wide entrance foyer that opens onto a 25-foot-long living room with fireplace that connects with pocket doors to a 17-foot-long dining room that opens onto a 13-foot-long library.  The apartment also has a 14-foot-long pantry and a 25-foot-long kitchen with an island.

Apartment 2B is a three-bedroom unit with a 17-foot-long entrance gallery that opens onto a 20-foot-long living room with a fireplace that opens onto a 20-foot-long dining room that opens onto a 20-foot-long library.  The gallery also leads to a long hall to the bedrooms and a 20-foot-wide kitchen with a wet-bar.

Apartment 10D is a two-bedroom unit with an entry foyer that leads to a 11-foot-long gallery that leads to a 28-foot-long living/dining room with a fireplace and opposing bay windows and is next to a 17-foot-long eat-in kitchen and a 12-foot-long staff/office.

Apartment 8F is a two-bedroom unit that has a 6-foot-wide entry foyer that leads to an 11-foot-long dining area near the 6-foot-long kitchen and a 21-foot-long living room with a decorative fireplace.

History

Roth collaborated with the Bings over four decades and, in 1915, they commissioned him to design three buildings, 601 West End Avenue and 570 and 1000 Park Avenue.

In his book, "Mansions in The Clouds, The Skyscraper Palazzi of Emery Roth," (Balsam Press, Inc., 1986), Steven Ruttenbaum wrote: "Flanking the main entrance on Park Avenue are two Gothic figures, one a medieval warrior and the other a builder, replete with masonic symbolism. Legend has it that Roth modeled these two figures after his clients, Leo and Alexander Bing. There are additional terra-cotta figures, executed in a grotesque manner, that depict the builders of Greek temples and medieval cathedrals. Proving even more visual interest are heavy terra-cotta loggias, string courses carved in luxuriant foliate motifs and punctuated with owls and squirrels, and spandrel panels molded with coats of arms and Gothic-style tracery. All this unusually styled ornament brings rich visual pleasure to the walls of this bulky structure."